Law enforcement agencies are dramatically increasing their use of Opal card public transport data to track the movements of people in New South Wales, with approvals for data more than doubling this year. New Transport for NSW figures provided to Guardian Australia show law enforcement agencies tried to gain access to Opal data 327 times in 2015, and were successful 96 times. Law enforcement requests had already doubled on 2015 levels by September, with a total of 608 requests, more than a third of which were granted. Transport for NSW would not say which agencies had requested the data, or how many of those requests came without a warrant. The data is managed by a third-party contractor, Cubic Transportation Systems, and Transport for NSW has a formal agreement with NSW police about accessing the data.

Source: The Guardian December 01, 2016 21:00 UTC